Let's Talk About Money and Affording Senior Living

Planning and Financing Senior Care: Insights with Erin Thompson

In this joint episode of the 'On the Mark Podcast and Financial Forum,' and Aspire for More with Erin podcast  co-host and guest Erin Thompson and Mark Maimon discuss the complexities of planning and financing senior care. Mark and Erin shares their vast experience in senior living, emphasizing the importance of early, tough conversations and proper planning. The discussion touches upon the high costs of senior care, the impact of real estate decisions, and alternative financing options including cash-out loans, rental property income, and reverse mortgages. They highlight the tax implications of selling a home before and after a senior passes away, and the potential benefits of strategic debt use. Both Erin and Mark stress the significance of employing trustworthy professionals to navigate these financial waters, ensuring the best outcomes for seniors and their families.

00:00 Welcome and Guest Introduction
01:33 The Rising Cost of Senior Care
02:15 Planning for Senior Care Expenses
06:47 Common Financial Challenges for Seniors
11:23 Tax Implications and Financial Strategies
15:55 Alternative Financing Options
21:24 Emotional and Psychological Aspects of Senior Care
23:02 Real Estate and Rental Income Strategies
30:22 Disaster Relief and Senior Care
33:57 Final Thoughts and Resources

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Transcript

0:36

Hi, everyone, I hope you are doing well, thank you for spending this time with me today. I wanted to give you a heads up and say that this episode is a little bit different because I was a guest on Mark Maimons on the mark podcast where we discuss. Financial matters and ways for our residents and prospects to afford senior living. So I got to discuss a lot of best practices. I saw families. Bring into tours and different conversations. Got to talk about my own story a little bit. He got to talk about his and I thought this is just a great conversation that every senior living leader needs to hear. And so that's why I'm bringing it to you on this podcast. you know, it's hard to have those money conversations. And here is just a little bit of a, a window into how I handled money conversations and some funny stories regarding our residents and money and unique ways that are out there that our residents and prospects can use the, the house that they're in as a way to pay for senior living and not sell it. And that's kind of new. So, I hope you enjoy this episode. I hope it brings you value and at least a good step in having the hard conversations with families about money. And as always, aspire for more for you. We're starting in right at a certain point of the conversation. We skipped all the niceties. Your time is valuable. Hope you enjoy it.

Mark: 2:14

Yeah, absolutely. And I, and I checked out your content and I really enjoyed it. And, I'm glad we connected because I think we, we share a similar values in wanting to serve coming from a place of service. And, I think that's so important specifically within the senior community. So thank you for all you do and for the, for the knowledge that you share. And I'm looking forward to sharing that with the, with our audience as well. So, so I think one of the things that We often come across, obviously we do financing for a living, so people usually ask us about financing is one of the issues is that the cost of care has just risen so much over the years and what we often find is that people aren't planning. Necessarily for that. They don't really have a plan for how, how are we going to cover the cost of care because it's always feels like it's something so far in the future. And I will deal with it then. And, you know, maybe we'll just pull out some money from our accounts or something like that. But I think people really underestimate how much care can cost. so I'm curious to get your thoughts on that.

Erin: 3:20

Well, care costs a lot of money. and honestly, that phase of life can happen to us at any given moment. And so, a perfect, a perfect example is when my grandmother, who lived to be 96, who thought, Because she had health issues when she was younger she lived her life thinking this was gonna be her last year, and she did not plan financially, conversationally, emotionally, psychologically about what this looks like. She never in her mind thought that she would live till 96 years old. And so we can take from her that you don't give your money away. because you're going to need it because she just felt like money wasn't even a thing for her because she wasn't going to need it. and that you, you have to start having the tough conversations during the easy times of life. through my 20 year experience inside senior living, I realized families who came prepared, had this binder and like each tab had something in it about their loved one and they had these conversations with people and they kind of knew what the plan was. And we all know that we can't control things, but there is something about having a plan that just gives a roadmap to when life kind of starts falling apart. It gives us an illusion of control, which therefore would give us somewhat of a peace of mind. One of the biggest problems, if that's the most impressive one, a son or a daughter coming in with a binder that has all of their health history, their list of their medications, their insurance cards, every doctor's visit that they could ever come up with. I mean, that was impressive. You would always have 10. Family members come in and just not know what to do, you know, yeah, for every one impressive, you would have probably 10 to 15 of, I have no idea what to do. And it's more in the mortgage

Mark: 5:21

industry. You're, you're pretty much describing my clients for everyday loans that we do as well, not just for seniors, but

Erin: 5:28

it seems like a

Mark: 5:28

common thread for sure.

Erin: 5:30

Yes. Yes. That's, that's the thing. So the more prepared you are in the good times, in preparation for the bad times. The more control you have, because you can never understand what it's like when your loved one, your aging loved one, is fine one day, and then something happens and the next day they're not, and you have no access to financials, you have no access to bank accounts, you have zero idea of how much money is in the bank, you don't know what options are available to you, And so walking that line of asking questions in a respectful way. Knowing that it's going that, that you will be the one responsible if they are not, if they cannot be responsible for themselves is a, is a big responsibility. And it's something that we should plan for.

Mark: 6:24

Yeah, for sure. And my family, I always like to share a personal experience. My family is going through sort of a similar transition. Fortunately, everyone's in, in pretty good health, but we just got very organized as a family and went through all the financial information. I think, even though. My family had a financial advisor. They were more focused on investments and growing. And then as my parents started thinking about retirement, it's a shift, right? You go from gaining assets to now using them and trying to figure out how long they might last. And so, so I've, I've been knee deep in that just over the last 30 days. And it's really enlightening to, and it feels good as a family to have that. Organization and you know, we're probably catching up on time. We probably should have spent years ago, but I think it's given my parents a peace of mind to know that. Okay. They've got, you know, some means to last them for a while and they can live their lifestyle and whatnot. But I do. I agree with you. I wish people would start that. Early as possible. Maybe we need to get a binder. We don't have a binder yet. We have a spreadsheet, but no binder We'll work on that. So because I want to come to you someday and have you be impressed And i'll know i've arrived as a as a sandwich generation Yes child of aging parents but what sort of common threads do you usually see with seniors as far as like their finances and where their challenges are

Erin: 7:52

Well, if you're a, if you're a family member and generations are going to, going to change, but if you're, if your loved one is not a baby boomer, but you know, of the older, I don't know what generation is before the baby boomers, but the kind that don't want to share information, that is certainly a common thread, but you have to dig deep and lean in and ask because so. One of the negative common threads you see is a family member or a loved one coming in and saying, I don't know what they have, you know, and I don't have any access. And then come to find out very little liquid assets and very much in, in, in real estate assets. Like they've lived in this house for 30 years, 25 years, they paid X amount for it. And now it's worth, you You know, 10 times that, what do they do? They feel like they, they don't want to touch what liquid, what little bit of liquid assets they have. 25, 000, 30, 000, 50, 000, 100, 000. They want to wait for the house to sell. Well, that can pose a really big problem if your loved one isn't safe. People don't want to spend what little money they have because they think they might need it. But you can't see the forest through the trees because they need it now, and that's why that money is there. Right, and

Mark: 9:14

selling a home, the common threads that we see is, as you describe, what we call house rich, cash poor, even though having 100, 000 is not poor by any means, but relative to the value of the home. And because property values have gone up so much across the whole country, over the last, you know, decade or two, most of people's net worth is tied up in their home. But like you said, the problem is timing. If you need that money now to pay for care, you're not gonna be able to sell your home right away. And the other common thread that we see is that. Senior's homes are not always show ready, so to speak. They're not, you know, maybe they have the same carpets from when they bought the house 30 years ago that need to be replaced, or a paint job or, you know, some of their belongings need to be removed from the home, and that that's not so easy to do quickly when you're a senior. And if you're dealing with medical challenges that need immediate attention, the last thing you're thinking about is curing off the bookcase, so to speak.

Erin: 10:14

Yeah. And especially if the, if your loved one's in. In the house, like you can't do all of that. You know, I was blessed to be able to buy a house from an older gentleman who was moving into senior living and it was as is and It was a blessing for us, but for them, they lost quite a bit of, of revenue, you know, of the sale price because everybody it's time or money, right? Time or money, time or money. and for them, it was time and, you know, we could fix these things. We have to be able to process things quickly. without a big cost to us. So that's a prime example of a family needing to make something happen quick and two people really benefiting from the need, But there are things, you and I have talked about, there are things available, and this is another common thread. If you're not prepared, you don't know what's available to you. And honestly, you don't have time to do the digging to figure out what's available to you. I mean, if you had 100, 000 in liquid assets, and we know that the average rate of senior living is 54, 000 a year. Okay, well, you've got a year and a half, you can do some digging, right? But, In a time of trauma, in a time of transition, in an emotional dis you know, dis disarray in life, when you move a loved one into senior living due to something that happened very quickly, you're not even capable of listening, retaining, implementing things because It is truly a shock when you have to do these things quickly.

Mark: 12:05

Yeah, and you have to prioritize in your own brain. I mean, that's how I work. I, my brain doesn't allow me to process lots of important things all at once. Right. You know, so most critical is making sure that the family member is safe and comfortable. And, and sometimes you don't have that time, but I think what often happens is that people think, okay, I'll sell my home, which is a perfectly viable option to help pay for care. But as you mentioned, it takes time. But also I think what people don't pay attention to is the, the taxes that they might pay. Let's say a senior has maybe a year left in their life, heaven forbid, but let's just say that's the case. If you sell the home before they pass, you're going to pay capital gains based on what they paid for it versus what they sell it for. If you're able to buy time, maybe it's with your own assets, maybe it's with a loan, which we'll, we'll talk about some of those options. And you can buy the time and you wait for the senior to pass. What happens is the tax basis, so the number that the IRS compares to what you sell it for, goes up to the, the date of death. So if it's worth, let's say it was worth 50, 000 when they bought it 30 years ago, and now it's worth a million dollars, the, if you wait until the person has passed already, then the value of the home for capital gains tax is the same as, When you sell it after they pass. So let's say a million dollars. So there's no capital gains tax at all. Versus if you sell it before they pass, even a day before they pass, you could be paying, you know, 100, 200, 000 dollars in taxes unnecessarily. So sometimes just understanding the the tax planning of it and the potential financing options where you might be able to finance some of the care costs, are important. And also, Sometimes you don't want to rush it because I'm sure maybe you've experienced where somebody maybe moved into. assisted living and then ended up going back home for, for long, you know, for home care. But if you sell your home, you don't have that option, you know, you've now gotten rid of your home. You, you don't have that choice. and hopefully that doesn't happen often, but I'm sure it does happen from time to time where somebody needs full time care at home. and that could be even more expensive.

Erin: 14:19

Yeah. I mean, it happens if, you know, Do the different state regulation, you know, each state is different. And so, you know, progressive disease happens and we cross a line from a regulatory standpoint, but I have also seen happy cases where someone had a stroke. They were younger, they got better, they lived with with us for a year, 6 months, they got better and they were able to go back home. You know, you have those scenarios too and. I don't know the details on those people, like, what their liquid assets were. Did they have long term care insurance? but they did have a home, or they were able to go to an apartment afterwards. So it's really, really important. Like, there is no black and white. Just like, you know, it's like having children, you, you, you can have a child and you, you don't know what you're going to get, you know, you just assume that it's going to be, you know, rainbows and butterflies in the garden full of blooms, but that's not that way for everybody. And it's the same way towards the end of life. We, we don't know what the journey is going to be and what, what we need. And so it's, it's better to be prepared. And this loan, I mean, that's an amazing concept. Of selling it while the person's alive. Versus selling it after they pass away. Like that's a huge savings.

Mark: 15:47

It's a massive savings. Far more

Erin: 15:49

that way nationally, not state to state.

Mark: 15:52

Yeah. That's IRS. Yeah. Yeah. It's called a step up in basis. That's the formal. classification of it. certainly I'm not an accountant in full disclosure, so don't take tax advice from, from this podcast, but you can ask your accountant about it. And, and it's, it's one of the nice benefits for seniors is that they have the option to not, the families don't have to necessarily pay that tax. If they plan accordingly. But oftentimes people think initially, Oh, I need money to pay for care. I'm going to sell the home. And that can be the worst decision, especially if you're in a high, you know, high priced area, like I'm in, you know, my, my primary markets are Los Angeles and New York city where properties are very expensive. So you, we, we have clients who bought their Brownstone in Brooklyn for, for 300, 000 and they're now worth 5 million. Like if they sell before they pass, they're going to lose a million dollars. so planning and, and potentially financing, even if you just leave the property empty for a few years, you're still way better off by doing that. and I think also, people oftentimes, default to reverse mortgages because it's, You know, it, and there is a place for them, for sure. They definitely serve a purpose. but there are some implications on that, especially if you end up having them for a long time. So have you seen people take out reverse mortgages to try to pay for the care?

Erin: 17:23

I haven't seen that too much, or I wasn't told. I have just certainly seen renting them out. Yeah. And selling them as the primary. And I will tell you, I, I have said to somebody like, these are some options for you and reverse mortgages being one of them, because there are a lot of family members that do not want to sell the house.

Mark: 17:48

Right. Right. If the family wants to keep it, you know, they want to keep it in the family so to speak because it's sentimental or maybe one of the adult children wants to live there eventually or they want their kids to live there or something like that. One of the challenges with reverse mortgages is that once the person passes or no longer lives there for a certain period of time, you, you're required to pay off the loan. So it puts a little bit of a burden on the family that if they can't. Refinance that loan easily. They don't qualify or whatever it may be. they may have no choice but to sell the home and not be a default of the, of that mortgage. But, yeah, that capital gains tax is a really big deal that I think people don't miss. And, I mean, I've, I've had clients over the years who are buying properties that weren't on the seller's side. So it wasn't really my place to advise on this where the senior was. very ill and selling their home in their very final days. And, you know, obviously they probably the family probably took a huge hit. And what they were trying to do was rush the closing so that the person would still be able to sign so that it didn't go into probate, which makes sense to a degree. But they probably paid a significant premium because They didn't wait. so it's just, it's, you know, that's why these types of discussions I think are so important because people just don't know these things. I mean, it's, it's not, nobody studies the IRS, you know, books on the weekend just for fun. Right. So, right. If you don't have proper advisors that are, you know, experts on taxation and, and other things, you may not even know any of this exists, but that's partly why we do what we do, right? To bring awareness to these topics and help people understand how to, you know, how to navigate them. But yeah, this, the selling, you get hit with that capital gains tax. you know, you can't move back home and your family can't, can't keep the home necessarily. That's a, that's a big problem. But also, when you liquidate your assets, what assets are there, ideally to grow over time. And when you're a senior. The idea is hopefully they're growing at a rate that's comparable to what it's costing you for care so that you're not actually depleting those accounts too much every month to where they'll eventually go away. So when you take money out of your investments, you're also stopping that compounding growth over time that can actually help pay for care. So, so that's why sometimes financing can be a really great solution. That's kind of where we come in. Is, is to provide, you know, our company does do reverse mortgages. And there are, like I said, there are, there are reasons why sometimes they are the right fit. The beautiful thing about them is you don't have a monthly payment. but there are some major, major downsides to them, in my opinion. the worst of which is kind of the opposite of investing money where, when when you invest money. The money grows on a compounding basis. So the longer you have it, the faster, the paces that it grows with a reverse mortgage, it's actually the opposite because you're paying interest on interest, on interest, on interest, and that accelerates. And you're basically giving away equity to the lender. on an accelerated basis. And then you have the issues of like, if you're not living there anymore, technically, you're supposed to get rid of the loan. and, you know, passing the property to family can be a little bit difficult. And they're also pretty limited on what percentage of the equity you can actually access. So again, there are, there are circumstances where a reverse mortgage is the right fit, but, people oftentimes don't know that there are alternatives. So, and that's kind of what I wanted to talk with you a little bit about. And you had mentioned that you've had some families who have rented properties. Yeah. Was that just to buy time until they kind of figured things out and just to cover the expenses or was it potentially to pay for care?

Erin: 21:49

I think it was kind of both. I think it was to generate revenue for the family. In my area, you're never going to charge. Well, never is a strong word, but it is rare that you would charge rent, the same amount of rent as it is For rent inside of a senior living community. Like it's typically not going to be the same amount. So it would be to help float some of the costs to generate some revenue or to give the person moving into senior living hope, like we're not selling your home. And that's another very emotional. Cause when we talk about planning, We're focusing a lot on financial planning today, but when you have these hard conversations early, you get to listen to podcasts like these and hear about the capital gains benefits and the negative benefits and the positive benefits of other options. But also there's an emotional component and a psychological component to, to moving into a senior living community. And if the home is super important to the person moving in, and you can look at your, your loved one, whether it's a family member or a friend, and you can say, we are going to keep this as long as we can. And then you make good faith efforts to figure out what options are out there for you. You give somebody hope who doesn't have any particular at that moment. Right. And I think that that was a huge component of why. A certain percentage of people would say, we're not going to sell your house, mom. I promise we're not going to sell your house. we're going to leave it there. And then that's not always a good thing. And then the next phase is, okay, well, now we're going to make you some money, mom, and we're going to put somebody in there. Right. And that turns into a headache for some people and, and, they're not prepared for everything that comes with that. And then, okay, mom, what can we do now? You know, that that's typically the phases that I've seen, but if family members didn't live in it, or, you know, have a grandchild that lives in it, or a niece or a nephew, you know,

Mark: 24:07

Yeah, and and what we've seen is that oftentimes it supplements other funds that they're using to pay for care because you're right that the rent you're going to get for a single family residence typically even in in most markets, I would just say are not going to be enough to cover. You know extensive care needs for the long term, but what it can do again is buy you and your family time So if it means that's buying you time until you are safe enough to move back in or Where you're buying time to avoid the capital gains tax that you might have if you sell it too soon You can generate income in the meantime. And one of the, I do a lot of real estate investing. So I love talking about this topic, but one of the beauties of real estate investing is that first of all, taking debt out from the property is a non taxable event. So you don't, if you cash out, whatever. 300, 000 to pay for care. That's not considered income from the IRS. So you can pull that money out and use it as you wish. and also the, the rental income that you get, even if you have positive rental income, in many cases, not all again, talk to your accountant, but can be written off. with depreciation write offs, meaning it's just a tax write off. It's not an actual expense. You're not paying money to somebody to depreciate your property, but you get a write off against the income. So sometimes that income is actually not taxed because it gets written off by other things. So if you can avoid the capital gains tax, Obviously, you have to put up with the, the nuances of being a landlord and what that entails, and you want to be really careful with that because, you know, like in Los Angeles, for example, the rent control laws are astronomically difficult to get people out if you want to come back in, or if you want to sell the house, it's not so easy necessarily to do that, so there's definitely some considerations, but if you have a good property manager, that's a great way to delegate some of that Work that you don't want to do, like you don't want the senior getting a call in the middle of the night saying, you know, the HVAC unit went down, you need help with that kind of stuff, but if somebody's able to pull equity out of the home to pay for the care, that money, if you do it as a lump sum, which is another alternative to, one of the reverse mortgage options is you can actually put that money with, you know, hopefully a financial advisor who knows what they're doing. That money will grow. You then get the rental income to offset the expense. You might get additional income beyond what it's costing you for the mortgage and your taxes and insurance, which can then be used for care. So you can use the gains from the money you're cashing out if you invest it properly. And you can use the rental income and now you're really offsetting a much higher Portion of that of that care and you're avoiding potentially the capital gains tax from selling it. So, if a family can stomach the idea of renting the property. It can really make a big difference, but even if they don't rent it out and they just want to leave it vacant for the time being, or they just need time to like settle into their new reality, even just avoiding the capital gains tax alone could be a huge savings if the senior has been in that home for a very long time.

Erin: 27:21

Yeah, so you would still have to pay the interest on 300, 000 out.

Mark: 27:27

Correct, but some of that that would be like when we plan with a family for those types of things, we're looking at okay, realistically, how much time do we need to buy some of that 300, 000 would go toward paying the mortgage over that period of time. So let's say the family wants to plan for five years. So we figure out how much are the payments going to be for that five year period. We make sure that's included in the amount that we suggest that they consider taking out, along with looking at the potential gains of those investments. That's more of a financial advisor discussion because we're big on engaging with all the different parties, the state attorneys, financial advisors, tax advisors. They all play a very important role in these decisions. But when you collaborate with all the right people, you can make really good decisions. So we work with the seniors and their families to try to figure out how much financing is appropriate based on their care needs and what they plan to do with the property after, you know, either the senior moves back in, or maybe they pass, hopefully not, but, and that's part of the overall planning that we do with people to help them figure that out. And I think people oftentimes think they default to the reverse mortgage in part because there's not really much. Qualification requirements. But that's where, that's where our education is really focused on right now is to let people know that there are alternatives where you can cash these funds out and actually invest that money and use it to make the payments on the mortgage that you're taking out to pay for care. And, so you can kind of use debt in a more strategic way. and you're not losing equity on a compounding basis where. You know where you might with with a reverse mortgage So there's some creative solutions that I think most people don't even know are possible i'll give you one quick example. There's a if if a family does decide to rent the property there's something called a dscr loan debt service coverage ratio loan, which looks at the rental income that they're getting Relative to the expenses of the property. And in some cases, even if their rental income is meaningfully less than, than the expenses, they can still get approval just based on being at like a. 50 to 75 ratio on that where they're still losing money But the bank's okay still lending them those funds. So it's all, it's not based on the senior's income and their, you know, standard underwriting criteria like a debt to income ratio or, you know, looking at their social security income or pension income or, you know, VA benefits or whatever it may be. It's just based on the cashflow of the building. So as long as a senior or their family member has the capacity to sign, which is a whole, it's a different issue. that comes up sometimes, then they can get loans much easier than people think. And oftentimes people default to the reverse mortgage because they think they won't qualify for any other type of loan. And that, that was just one example is if they rent the property, that's one type of loan, but there are others that don't require them to rent it as well, where they can pull out financing and usually at lower rates and lower closing costs than a, than a reverse mortgage. So that's part of what we, you know, want to get out there.

Erin: 30:41

You know, this is why social media and podcasts are so amazing. I mean, like, really people talk about how, and I, everybody should go to college or go to a trade school. That's not what I'm saying here. But this is, this is the stuff that they don't teach you that now all of a sudden social media and podcasting gives you these golden nuggets on that. Maybe you don't understand everything because I didn't understand everything he just said, but I know that I can go to these people and I can say, Hey, I heard about this. I want to knock. I want to know more about this and then figure out what will this work in my situation. And this is part of the planning the pre planning process. My husband does disaster relief work and he was down after the hurricane. We're in the southeast. He was in Florida and these homes in Saint Pete Beach are. Are just generational homes. I mean, sure, there's the new homes, right, but there's these generational homes that have been in the family for, you know, since the 1800s. I mean, some of these homes were very, very historic and you think about it. I mean, these are conversations they had to do with somebody to keep this home in the family. For with 10 kids and all the other things because I was talking to these these people at the beach when they were I'm, like did it get destroyed because these houses didn't but these older homes Couldn't withstand the wind and the water that was coming in, you know

Mark: 32:18

Yeah,

Erin: 32:19

and I mean could you imagine? That was probably built on That that house probably was 10, 000 to build. And right now is it a per prime example that would be millions upon millions of dollars just for the land, right?

Mark: 32:36

Yes. But even more valuable with the house on it for sure.

Erin: 32:40

Yes.

Mark: 32:42

Yeah, I mean, and maybe I should connect with your husband too, because we, we recently got a call similar, very similar situation related to seniors in particular from a, I won't mention the name, but a prominent, operator of CCRC communities, that has, There's homes in parts of Georgia that are in a disaster zone that were hit by Hurricane Helene, probably where you're, you know, near where your husband was helping people. And there, they had planned to move into the CCRC community which, as you probably know, have large entry fees, and they were planning on either selling their home or pulling equity from their home but when the home's damaged, you can't easily do either or you just lose so much value if you're selling it just for land value rather than rebuilding it, then you have to sell it to somebody who's willing to come in and build a house from scratch, theoretically, or repair major damage. So we're, we're in, in discussions with them about potentially helping people with construction financing and things like that. So we have other aspects of what we do that can help people. people through disasters and, you know, the wildfires in California have been disastrous for seniors and communities as well. And, you know, there's so many things going on these days with natural disasters. Not that that was the point of our conversation today, but, there are different ways that we can help people through these challenges because even seniors go through these disasters. And now all their plans that they had to move in this community that they may have been on a waiting list for months, and all of a sudden they have the opportunity but their house is damaged and they can't take action on it or they think they can't but that's why we're in touch with them is to try to facilitate helping them figure that out. Yeah. So and that's, that's honestly like The joy of what we do is is helping people through these situations. And now that I've gone through it, I'm not a disaster fortunately, but just planning with with our family and trying to stay ahead of things. just puts everyone at ease I can speak from personal experience, please do that get a binder. It's better than my spreadsheet. I'm sure more organized. And if you're applying for alone, you're better off. Love you. If you come in that organized, but I agree with you. I think some of these topics just come up in conversation. That's the beauty of social media and podcasts and just getting good information out there to our respective networks. So, so I, I really appreciate your time. Tell us how can people find you? Cause I know you, you have the podcasts and I know you also coach leadership within the senior. Living communities. So how can people find you if they if they want to get in touch?

Erin: 35:16

i'm most active on linkedin And honestly i'm trying to find the bandwidth to really talk about my The first love which is helping families and resident future residents look for right senior living communities know how to find the right ones What do you want out of a senior living community? I hope to start building, content out like that to be consistent on Instagram and Facebook, but Aaron Thompson, or aspire for more with Aaron. On Facebook, but Aaron Thompson on LinkedIn, you can search Aaron Thompson on Instagram and I will come up. I do want to say just in passing just so you're the listeners know how much growing older costs what a blessing it is, but just some ideas for you to have, Genworth, which was a long term care insurance company in 2021. these are the, the national median costs. Okay, for a private 1 bedroom apartment and assisted living 4500 dollars per month, which divides out to 148, 148 dollars per day, which is 54, 000 dollars annually. Okay, that is national average. That's not, you know, the cost in Boston versus the cost in Alabama, South Dakota, you know, that is national median. for a nursing home, a long-term care community where you are private pay, it is$9,000, around$9,000 per month, which equals out to$297 per day,$108,000 per year. And then home health. So if you wanted to have a home health care aid aide inside a companion inside your community or inside your home and not move to a community, this is a 40 hour work week, which is only eight hours. Okay, it's only like a 7 to 3 or a 10 to, 4, that's 6, so like a 10 to 6. You're looking at$154 per day, which is$19 an hour, and$56, 000 a year, which we know is going to be more expensive in California than it's going to be more expensive in Florida or Alabama or Georgia. And even in South Dakota versus Massachusetts, There's, there's a big discrepancy. So where you live matters and just know that it's, if it's private pay, national median, so you're talking about in like small potential group homes versus large CCRCs, there's a huge difference there in cost, but you can assume, I would even say 5, 000 per month. for a 1 bedroom apartment, you have studios, you have shared rooms. There's many different options, but assuming 50 to 75, 000 dollars annually, I will have to have in order to pay private pay. And obviously there are other options. I mean, just in my own grandmother's story, my aunt helped, supplement pay. And if you have that amazing opportunity, you have, you have that as well. So when you have the hard conversations during easy times, lean into the discomfort. They're not going to want to talk about it. But if you see early signs of dementia, the web is an awful place. For your loved one because they're gonna sell you cruises and why not buy a cruise because it's a really great deal I have seen men specifically Give everything away on the internet to women who think they're coming Shipping 20, 000 in a teddy bear that got caught in customs like I can begin to tell you things that happen so Just having the internet password is really important to where you can keep an eye on your bank ac on your loved one's bank account without them knowing. Get that password, do not use and abuse it, just review it and figure out if you have problems. Because We're entering a time that there are more and more people who are going to want to take advantage of your loved one, and the more prepared you are, the better you can protect them.

Mark: 39:32

Yeah. There's my soapbox. No, I couldn't agree more. I heard a story just yesterday about a gentleman who was starting to, to have issues with, dementia and he bought a, he bought a car and then he forgot where he parked it. And so he went and bought another one. And then it happened three or four times where now all of a sudden, but they couldn't find the cars so it's it's important and as it relates to financing It gets significantly more difficult to get a loan for a senior to help pay for care when they aren't able to Mentally, you know, like they don't have the capacity to sign on their own behalf So when the notary comes to sign the documents if they think that the person doesn't have the capacity They will not allow them to sign You And they won't ensure the title. So that's why the pre planning that you've talked about, when times are good, is so much more important to plan those things ahead of time, because you might not, those options may go out the window completely, literally speaking, and, and figuratively, if you don't plan ahead and do these things before These issues come so the planning is I cannot I cannot say strongly enough how important that is Whether you take a loan or not just anything the further ahead you can stay from these things from a planning perspective the better You'll never go wrong.

Erin: 40:56

I will say I had a resident. I know we got to end But this is really funny story to compliment yours. He used to own car dealerships. He was really really big time in another state And when his daughters, took his keys away he's like, he just called people up and be like, Hey, give me a car here. You know what I mean? Like, didn't even have to do anything just because of who he was. A car was delivered, you know? So you are all going to have roadblocks and hurdles that you would have never imagined just depending on who your loved one is. So prepare yourself. It's a wild ride sometimes. For sure.

Mark: 41:30

And, and also met the professionals that you're working with because Unfortunately, seniors are susceptible to scams and people taking advantage of maybe not having their best interest in mind. And that's why. I, I invited you on today, Aaron, because I know you're, you're so committed to, to making sure that people are cared for and, and dealt with in a, you know, in a positive way. And that's definitely how we approach things as well. So we're definitely like minded in that way, but the professionals you work with matter, and the quality of professionals and the people who feel like they need to protect, you know, seniors and put a, I always say, I want to put a protective bubble around them. That's my, that's my calling is to, you know, to do what I do to, to help them with the financing, but also to protect them from other people in my industry who maybe don't have their best interests in mind. So, you know, it's so important. So, well, Aaron, thank you so much for joining us. I really appreciate all your insight. I'm sure we will be engaging plenty, hopefully not only around disaster areas and things like that. Hopefully people can make these decisions. It's hard enough to make these decisions, hopefully not during a, during or right after a natural disaster as well. But thank you so much. And I would definitely encourage anybody who's on the call today, and checking out this episode to, to check out Aaron's podcast. They are really good. That's how I connected with her at first. As I saw one of hers that talked about paying for care and it didn't mention all these mortgage things. So I know an expert like you, if these things weren't aware on your radar, that they likely are not on most people's radar. So that's why I wanted to make sure we had a chance to connect and get this message out there. So. Thank you so much, Erin. I really appreciate it.

Erin: 43:14

My pleasure. Thank you.

Mark: 43:16

Okay. Take care.